29 February 2016

So my first month
of hosting Eat Your Greenshas come to an end and it's time to
write the round up. It's hard to believe that February is already ending, but I'm quite glad that I get an extra leap day for writing this post nevertheless.

Thank you so much everyone for participating in the challenge, they were all beautiful entries! Next month it's again Shaheen'sturn to host, so keep sharing
those lovely green vegetable recipes with us.

So here are the February recipes, click the links to get to the full posts:

Lisa
from Lisa's Kitchen shared a vibrant Quinoa Salad with Vegetables and Cashewswith us.
This is a very comforting and filling winter salad with roasted root
vegetables, quinoa, different seeds and tomatoes. It contains
Brussels sprouts and green kale as the green vegetables. I would want
to eat this anytime, as it's a salad just after my own heart. I
really like such warm and cold salads.

Emily
from Cooking for Kishore blog shared her interesting post Spinach Chili Khachapuri (Georgian Egg Boats)with
the challenge. I especially like the story behind this, how she got acquainted with the dish in her childhood through a friend. The
homemade pastry contains a spicy mixture of feta, mozzarella, chili chutney
and spinach and the baked dish is finished with a quail's egg on the
top. This does sound like an amazing dish and it looks very good too.
I definitely wouldn't mind trying this.

My
Eat Your Greens co-host Shaheen from Allotment to Kitchen cooked aButternut, Kale and Sweetcorn Stew with Nooch Dumplings.
I really like stews at the moment and this one seems to be
particularly hearty. The green vegetable here is curly kale and the
stew itself is very rich and comforting sounding containing butternut
squash and sweetcorn. Shaheen used vegetarian suet to make the herby
dumplings, which is a new method for me, but sounds like it's a good
binding agent for dumplings. You can find more information about this
method on her blog.

My
own contribution was an obviously green choice Thai green curry. I really adore vegan
Thai curries and can't get enough of them at the moment. I used pak
choi and asparagus in this one and of course made the green paste
with green chillies, Thai basil and coriander.

That was the
February round up for Eat Your Greens, I hope you liked it.

28 February 2016

Here are a few
photos from my visit yesterday to Craft Beer Rising beer and cider
festival in London. This year I thought that it was even better than
ever, as they had moved it into a slightly bigger and brighter part
of the Old Truman Brewery. We tasted many different beers and only
one cider, but it was very good.

The highlight of
the festival for me were Mikkeller. I hadn't seen them on the
list of the brewers in advance, so I wasn't expecting them to be
there. TheirBlueberry Bluebic and Peter, Pale and Mary Pale
Ale were just amazing beers. I was sad that the bluebic sold out
before I could have more, but on the other hand glad to see that it
was successful.

Big Hug Brewery
had some excellent beers once again and they are just such nice
people, so it's a pleasure to support their brewery. Also by buying
their beer you can save the rain forest at the same time.

From Goose
Island we tasted this amazing stout, which has been aged in
bourbon barrels. I might make a separate post about it later, as we
also took a couple of bottles for take away, but it was just
incredible, so not sure if I could find the right words to describe
it.

As I mentioned we
concentrated more on beers this time, but the new cider I detected is
a really significant find and they had quite a proud cider section
this year, which was nice to see. You might remember my recent review
of the Caple Road cider. Well, they were there introducing
their new dry version of the Caple Road! I really liked it, and I
would expect to post more about this soon.

Also the food
offering was better this year and we got to taste some yummy
vegetarian street food like margherita calzones and Indian lentil
snacks. I was so happy that we took a six pack of cheese and onion
pies by Square Pie with us for the train journey back. No
train snack has ever been better, I now also want to make some mini
pies!

So that was my day
out yesterday, today I'll be just chilling and cooking at home.

25 February 2016

Alright, I wanted
to share a few things with you from my February food and drink, as the month is soon ending. I also want to remind you about
the Eat Your Greens cooking challenge. There's still time to
submit your February entries!

The food I've
cooked this month and not posted on the blog has mainly been winterly
comfort food, warming curries, roasts, soups, creamy sauces,
home baked bread... here are some of the dishes depicted.

I've made this
Balsamic onion and roasted pepper focaccia twice this month
and have taken some to work in my lunchbox. The focaccia slices made
quite a nice addition to the lunchbox and I actually ate them for
breakfast. In this lunchbox there's also a stir fry with udon noodles
and I soon want to share more udon noodle dishes with you, as I
absolutely adore the wide udon at the moment.

Another interest
of mine have been lambic beers, which are spontaneously
fermented by wild yeasts and very interesting tasting. I already
wrote an own post about the Spontanbasil, but I also loved
this elderflower one.

Other new items in
my kitchen or old favourites that I want to show to you are:

Dried black
badger peas – can't wait to get creative with those ones, they
will surely make a good winter dish. Would you have any good suggestions for these?

My favourite
tahini – I have recently grown fond of this tahini brand.
It's very smooth, tasty and good quality, the jar only empties way too quickly.

Whole Earth
organic colaand lemonade – I don't drink soft drinks much, but
once or twice a week a refreshing drink is really nice. If you want
some change, look out for the Whole Earth organic range. I really
like these drinks and their art work.

Whole Earth
organic peanut butter – This smooth organic peanut butter is
also from Whole Earth and other variations also exist. I do use
peanut butter for dips and sauces, but not so much on breads.

Spelt couscous
– I just wanted to try what spelt couscous is like and bought a
small packet. It seemed to be slightly nuttier than normal couscous,
unless I'm just imagining this.

Halen Môn
Anglesey oak smoked sea salt – This is a beautiful product to
add some smokiness to your dishes.

That's pretty much
it for now. Do you have any favourites among these products? Have you
detected any new lovely stuff recently?

24 February 2016

I really adore
spicy Thai flavours in a soup (and other dishes!) and felt like it
was time to cook such a soup again. It has still been fairly chilly
here, which is weird, as it's soon March. Well I'm not complaining,
because I still have the excuse to cook wonderful winter food.

So I have made
similar soups to this many times, but once again I altered the recipe
slightly. I used harlequin squash as the main ingredient, but also
added carrots and red lentils to the soup to give it a bit more
substance. This was such a comforting soup also due to the fragrant
fresh Thai basil and coriander and here's how it was made.

Ingredients

2 onions

1 tbsp vegetable
oil

2 red chillies

4 garlic cloves

2 cm ginger
(roughly same amount as garlic)

1 harlequin squash

1 l vegetable
stock

½ cup red lentils

4 carrots

1 lemongrass stalk

3 kaffir lime
leaves

160 ml coconut
cream

Juice of ½ lime

Soy sauce to taste

1 tsp palm sugar

Handful of Thai
basil

Handful of fresh
coriander

Method

Chop the onions
and cook in vegetable oil until they are soft.

Add the finely
chopped garlic, ginger and chilli and cook for about one minute more.

Cut the harlequin
squash into cubes and the carrots into slices and add them into the
pan.

Sauté them for a
while and then add the vegetable stock followed by the lentils.

Add the finely
chopped lemongrass and kaffir lime leaves.

Let the soup
simmer under the lid at moderate heat.

After a while also
add the coconut cream into the soup.

Season the soup
with lime juice, soy sauce and palm sugar.

Chop fresh
coriander and Thai basil and add them to the pan towards the end.

Once the squash,
carrots and lentils are soft, purée the soup and taste if any more
seasoning needs to be added.

21 February 2016

I
opened my own Youtube channel today, as I'm planning to occasionally
publish a cooking video. I once already posted a purple sprouting broccoli and potato soup video and it was great fun making it. Of
course it's much more work editing the videos, but I like it. You can
find my channel here.

So
today I filmed myself making portobello pizzas with thin spelt-wheat
crust. I didn't use tomato sauce in these, but just put tomato slices
onto the base instead. I made 3 pizzas from these ingredients. It
depends on the size of each pizza and the thickness of the crust, how
many you'll get.

20 February 2016

While the
strawberry plants start pushing through in the pots on the balcony, I
start wondering what I should plant this year. I'm quite indecisive
at the moment, but I think I will definitely want to grow some
tomatoes, as they have been quite successful on the balcony in
previous years. Obviously I hope that the strawberries will actually
make it through and there will be some small early strawberry crops.
Similar to last year, I think I'll pass on the courgettes, as pretty
as the flowers are, but the plants easily take over the whole
balcony.

I would also like
to grow more edible flowers this year. They are nice for the visiting
bees and pretty in dish presentations and to look at.

But what else...?
What are your gardening plans and would you have any tips or ideas
for me? I guess I'll need to get started soon and also tidy up the
balcony more, the glass windows should be cleaned the first thing.

I bought this
extremely practical silicone herbstick from the Science museum in
London. Fresh herbs and different herb mixtures can be frozen there
for instant use. It's nice to store fresh herbs in this fashion as
well, as they are very convenient to use for example for weekday
meals.

I currently have
in my herbstick a mixture for pasta, which consists of rocket, basil,
garlic, olive oil and smoked paprika. I can't wait to add some to
today's tomato and mozzarella ravioli dish.

18 February 2016

I found these
wonderful balsamic infused onions in the shop and had to try them.
They were very good indeed and added a perfect flavour to my homemade
focaccia. I paired the onions with some antipasti roasted peppers.
This was a very nice bread as a side dish or a snack.

My focaccia recipe
is so very easy and it can be made with many different toppings. This
time I even added a bit of spelt flour into it to have a slightly
darker bread. There's hardly any kneading and shaping in this recipe,
the focaccia almost makes itself.

Ingredients

300 ml wheat flour

200 ml spelt flour

1 tbsp dry yeast

1 tsp sugar

1 tsp salt

200 ml lukewarm
water

2 tbsp olive oil

Balsamic infused
onions

Roasted peppers

20g grated
vegetarian pasta cheese

Sea salt

Method

Mix the dry
ingredients together, add the lukewarm water and olive oil and mix
into a dough.

Stretch the dough
onto a baking tray and let rise under a tea towel for about one hour.

Press lightly the
halved balsamic infused onions and sliced roasted peppers into the
dough and sprinkle some sea salt and grated vegetarian pasta cheese
on the top.

17 February 2016

The weather has
been getting a little chillier here again, so I turn to my winter
favourites like jacket potatoes for comfort and warmth. I have also
been eating many soups and curries. I wouldn't mind if it stays cold
for a while considering what lovely food I feel like eating then.
What are your winter favourites?

So for these
jacket potatoes with soft cheese filling, I chose the biggest baking
potatoes that I could find. In my student days I quite often used to
make this sort of bell pepper infused soft cheese and added it to all
sorts of dishes. I had been planning for quite a while now to use it
as a filling for chunky baked potatoes and it actually worked rather
well. I will certainly be making these again! I'm very fond of the
whipped soft cheese due to its lightness.

Ingredients

4 large baking
potatoes

Vegetable oil

Sea salt

3 orange bell
peppers

2 onions

4 garlic cloves

Salt

Ground black
pepper

300 g whipped soft
cheese

On the side: A
salad with blood oranges and mixed leaves

Method

Stab the potatoes
several times each with a fork and roll them in an oil and sea salt
mix. Place on a baking tray and bake until done.

Chop the onions
and garlic finely and cut the bell peppers into cubes. Slow cook them
in a pan until they are soft and season with salt and pepper. Let
them cool and mix with the soft cheese. You can add some fresh basil
into the mix, if you like. Put the mix into the fridge to wait for
the potatoes.

Once the potatoes
are done, fill them with the soft cheese and pepper mix and serve. I
added a blood orange salad to the side for some additional freshness.

16 February 2016

I got to know several beers from
Mikkeller's Spontan range when I visited Copenhagen last Easter, so I
was obviously directly curious when I saw a bottle of Mikkeller and
Lindemans collaboration beer Spontanbasil 6,0
% at my local beer shop. Obviously I had to buy it (and a
second bottle in the meanwhile). It tasted so wonderful with such a
strong basil flavour, it was just deligthful. It almost doesn't taste
like beer at all, just like a refreshing basil drink.

I just booked my next visit to
Copenhagen and I can't wait to have more of this and the other beers
from Mikkeller's Spontan range. I'm so excited to go there again in
March and hope to post many lovely Copenhagen posts for you.

Here are my tasting notes and
impressions:

- the cork already heavily smells of
basil

- the beer itself smells like an herb
garden, herby with some lemon

- there's an initial punch of sour,
which is directly followed by a strong basil taste underlined with
fine hops

- there is a fresh lemon taste
throughout

- the initial taste is very bold and
powerful, lambic sourness leading to a fragrant and refreshing
aftertaste

- there's more basil than hops in this
beer

- the sourness comes from the lambic
style of brewing, wild yeast is used to ferment the beer

I can't get enough of this beer and
can't help planning which dishes it would compliment the most, would
insalata caprese be too much of a clichee with this?

Who is The VegHog?

A vegetarian hobby cook and urban gardener born in Finland, currently living in Denmark. I try to develop my cooking skills by making a wide variety of veggie dishes, some of them traditional and some new creations. My favourites include veggie burgers, squashes, organic and local produce, cider, spelt, rye, pizzas, pasta dishes, risottos and sea-buckthorn.
Follow theveghog on Instagram and @TheVegHog on Twitter!